Chapter 1
A month after S.H.I.E.L.D. dissolved and the helicarriers went down, Steve finally found Bucky Barnes. Captain Rogers had enlisted his now closest friends Sam Wilson and Natasha Romanoff in the search for his long lost friend. The Winter Soldier was AWOL , trying to survive in modern New York after fifty plus years of HYDRA brainwashing and cryosleep. Steve's search team figured Bucky would be found in the city's less mainstream areas: possibly in abandoned underground subway stations, dense areas of central park,under bridges or old train lines.
After countless scouting trips, the team's hypothesis was found to be true when Natasha located Bucky under an old concrete bridge crossing a creek in Central Park. The shine from his metallic arm is what gave him away. Besides that, The Winter Soldier was barely visible due to the brush and greenery that surrounded the bridge, plus the fact that the bridge was located in a little immediately contacted Steve and Sam on her earpiece. "Hey Cap, I found your friend. He looks pretty rough." She proceeded to give them her coordinates.
Steve and Sam radioed her back, saying they'd be there in a few. In the mean time, she would try to find out exactly what they'd be dealing with. She crept closer to the soldier and got out binoculars. She didn't want to get too close, she didn't know how he'd react. The Winter Soldier was sleeping, wrapped in a couple ratty blankets that he probably stole off some homeless people. There were paper fast food bags strewn around that looked like he dug them out of a trashcan. His prosthetic arm looked a bit rusty. Nat guessed living under a bridge where water was constantly dripping and right next to a stream were probably not he best environment for Bucky's metal prosthetic arm.
"Natasha. We're approaching you right now." Steve said through the earpiece.
"Keep it down. Your friend's looking a lot like sleeping beauty right now."
Steve came up behind Natasha and looked at what remained of his best friend. "Pass me the binoculars, will you?'" he whispered.
Natasha nodded and handed them over. Steve looked closer at Bucky's living conditions. He was so angry, angry at Hydra, angry at everything that made his friend this way.
"Okay, guys. I'm going to go down there and try to talk to him. Sam , go around to the other side of the bridge and watch for me in case I need backup. Nat, stay here and do the same. Do not go in unless I give a signal. I don't know how he'll react to me, let alone you guys."
Sam and Nat agree. Sam leaves to go to his post and Steve starts to walk toward the bridge. Natasha stops him with a hand on his shoulder. She holds out a syringe loaded with a thick purple liquid. "Hey. I know you don't want it to go down like this, but in case it does you need to be prepared. This is just a strong sedative: he'll be out in a few seconds after you use it. If he's not willing to listen, or if he flips out on you, inject it. If you don't, I have a gun and I will use it. Captain America is more valuable to the preservation of S.H.I.E.L.D. than an ex-Hydra assassin."
"I understand." Steve said, then carefully made his way down the steep hill that lead to the bridge. He took a deep breath and stepped a bit closer. "Bucky" he whisper-yelled. Steve thought giving his friend a little warning would be a better strategy than sneaking up on him. He took another few steps forward. Rogers was now only a couple feet from the sleeping assassin. "Buck. I know you're in there. I just wanna talk."
At the sound of Steve's voice, The Winter Soldier shot up from under his covers, a dagger in hand. He took a defensive stance, preparing to face off any attacker.
"Whoa, Bucky. It's fine, everything's fine." Steve said with his hands out, showing he wasn't armed. He didn't even have his shield.
"Steve?" Bucky questioned. "You've been looking for me?"
"Yeah, of course. I was worried."
"You were worried?" Bucky laughed in disbelief. "I shot you, multiple time. I was sent to kill you."
"That wasn't you. That was Hydra, The Winter Soldier. This is Bucky Barnes, my best friend." Steve explained motioning toward the man in front of him.
Bucky didn't believe him. He knew he was guilty of everything he'd done, but now wasn't the time to argue about that. "So what are you wanting? Why are you here?"
"I want you to come back with me. You can live with me. I know people that can help you. I even know a guy that can fix up your arm, probably even make it better."
"I don't think I can do that. I don't deserve it. And S.H.I.E.L.D. will lock me away." Bucky explained, sounding as defeated as he looked.
"No they won't. I'll explain everything, it will all work out. I promise. Please just come with me."
Bucky looks down at the ground, and his hair flops down in his face. "I...I guess I'll come with you. Beats this dump anyways." Bucky says smiling, sounding like his old self, as he pushes his hair out of his face and looks back up. Steve sees the smile for a split second, but then a blank, hard look comes across Bucky's face.
"You brought S.H.I.E.L.D!" he yells and launches himself at Steve. He tries to stab Steve with his dagger, but the super-soldier ducks out of the way.
He must have seen Natasha. Steve thinks to himself. "They're allies, Buck!" Steve yells while wrestling with the assassin, still trying to reason. He realizes that no amount of talking is going to stop his friend now and pulls out the tranquilizer. Just as he jabs the syringe into Bucky's thigh, Natasha and Sam both sprint from their respective positions to the scene.
"Cap! Are you alright?" Sam asks.
"Yeah, I'm alright." Steve sighs. Bucky is completely out, lying on the ground.
"I know how it feels to be on the run. This is probably the best sleep he's had in a while." Natasha comments.
Steve stands up and,with a little bit of effort, gently tosses Bucky over his shoulder. "Let's get him back to the tower."
At Avenger's Tower, the team puts Bucky in on of the containment units on the lowest level of the building. Trusted S.H.I.E.L.D. scientists, psychiatrists, and other agents have set up shop here while the agency is under scrutiny. They let him sleep off the sedative while doctors make sure his is alright health wise.
Steve, Sam, and Natasha are watching him sleep from the other side of a reinforced glass window into the containment unit.
"Do you think he'll be okay?" Steve asks Natasha. He knows she's had experience with the Red Room.
She thinks for a moment. "I think he might be able to regain at least some sense of normalcy. He was strong enough to break through some of the brainwashing on his own. He should make some sort of recovery with help."
"If I've learned anything from working at the VA office, it's that these kind of things just take time." Sam inputs.
Steve nods. "You guys are right. I just want him back."
"Mr. Rogers?" a doctor interjects "Mr. Barnes is awake and requesting to see you."
Steve looks in the window and sees Bucky sitting up in bed, waiting for him.
Natasha lightly slaps Steve on the back. "We'll catch up with you later, Cap." she says, then she and Sam walk away down the hall.
Steve looks to the doctor for direction. "Follow me." The doctor leads him to a locked steel door, which leads into Bucky's cell/hospital room."There is no sound feed from the room, but we do have visual. Right now Mr. Barnes is calm and stable, but if something goes wrong, give us a signal. We'll get you out of there."
"Okay, thank you." Steve says before he enters the stark white room.
Bucky stares at his friend and motions him to his bedside. His right arm is handcuffed to the bedrail, but both Steve and Bucky know that wouldn't stop him if slipped into Winter Soldier mode.
There is an awkward silence where all they do is stare at each other.
"So, uh, how's it going?" Bucky nervously laughs.
"It's going good, all things considered. Are you...okay now?"
"Yeah, for now."
They make small talk for a couple minutes, then Steve cuts to the chase. "The S.H.I.E.L.D. people are going to ask you everything you know about Hydra. I know there's things you aren't going to want to talk about to them. If there's anything-"
"Steve." Bucky interrupts.
"Yeah?"
"There's another one, at the Hydra base in Moscow."
"There's another what?"
"Another one of me, a dame, goes by Shadow. Her real names Katherine Slavina. I remembered it while I was hiding out under the bridge. I wrote it down, so someone would know in case I couldn't remember again." Bucky says, pulling out a crumpled slip of paper and setting it on the bedside table.
Steve was blown away. He hadn't heard of another assassin. Natasha might know, with all the contacts she has. He made a mental note to ask about this Shadow later.
"She arrived about a year after I did. They used her in more delicate missions, missions that required a bit more finesse than I could provide. We worked as a team sometimes. She didn't have quite the amount of brainwashing I had. She still needed to have social skills, to be able to seduce information out of people. That made her good in the field, but not so much in containment. I remember how much she screamed and fought during "training". The most memorable thing was the time she bit off one of our handlers fingers. She was a lot less rebellious after that punishment."
Steve let all that soak in. They'd have to find her. He couldn't live with knowing there was a woman out there going through the same thing Bucky did.